Addressing device



March 26, 1929. E. B. PYLE 1,707,095

ADDRESS ING DEVICE Filed July 5, 1928 I ,gf d/ 1 -1 o i i Q I l l F I l I l 9 i I /6 J --*--/Z is ATTORNEYS Patented Mar. 26, 1929.

UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

ELMER B. PYLE, OF NEW YORK, N. Y., ASSIGNOR TO THE ADDRESSIT MANUFACTUR- ING- COBIORATION, OF NEW YORK, N. Y., A CORPORATION OF NEW YORK.

ADDBESSIN G DEVICE.

Application filed July 8, 1928. Serial' No. 290,186.

This invention relates to addressing de vices, and particularly to address strips. Strips or bands of address plates or sectlons have been heretofore proposed for the purpose of transferring addresses to letters and envelopes. These devices have their greatest use when it is desired to send out circular letters to a comparatively large number of different persons.

There is a certain class of circularizing work in which it is of little importance whether the address of each different individual is written in the same character of writing as the body of the letter. There are other classes of such work, however, in which it is highly desirable to cause the address at the head of the letter, and on the envelope to be especially neat and attractive, and this is particularly necessary when it is desired to have each one of the letters appear to be a personal letter written individually to each of the persons on the address list.

In order to accomplish this result, it is necessary that the printing or typing of the address at the head of the letter agree so close 1y with the printing or typing of the body of the letter, as to be diflicult or substantially im ossible to discover the difference.

ccordingly, the object of the presentinvention is to provide an address strip which can be cheaply made and yet which is capable of reproducing an address on letters and envelopes and the like in such close similarity to the character of the typing or writing used in the body of the letter that it is difiicult or impossible to distinguish between them.

Another object of the invention is to provide an address strip of indeterminate length and constructed of fibrous material and which, because of its particular construction,

is especiall convenient to use both in applying the ad resses to the strip initially, and in transferrin the addresses to the letters, envelopes an the like.

A further object of the invention is to provide an address strip made of fibrous material and constructed in the form of a strip of indeterminate length to which the series of addresses can be readily applied.

A further object of the invention is to provide an address strip made of fibrous material which can be readily and successively passed through an addressing machine without substantial wear upon the strip.

Another object of the invention is to provide an address stri of such construction that an extraordinarily large number of addresses may be stored in a relatively small space.

The invention will be further described in connection with the accompanying drawings which illustrate by way of example the preferred form of my improved address strip. In these drawings:

Fig. 1 is a perspective view looking down utpon a relatively short section of the address s rip;

Fig. 2 is a bottom view of the address strip; and

Fig. 3 is a perspective view of a roll of the improved address strip showing the compactness with which a relatively large number of addresses may be stored.

Referring now to the accompanying drawings, the improved address strip of my invention comprises a carrier web 10, and a continuous strip 11 of stencil material. Carrier web 10 is made of fibrous material, preferably a heavy grade of manila paper, although a fabric, such as cotton or linen may be used, if desired.

The carrier web 10 is of grid-like construction caused by the provision of uniformly spaced preferably rectangular perforations 12, the spacing between these perforations being sufficient to leave transverse bars 13 that join together the side marginal portions 14 which extend lengthwise throughout the length of the address strip. After the carrier web 10 has been prepared in this manner, the stencil material 11 is secured to the bottom thereof as may be seen in Fig. 2 by the use of a suitable adhesive. The continuous stencil strip 11 is preferably composed of a high grade stencil paper or cloth of the type which has a coating of material such as collodion thereon that is readily displaceable bymarking on the paper with a stylus, or by means of the bare type of a typewriting machine. Such paper after having the desired characters written or typed thereon, readily permits the passage of ink where the coating has been removed by the stylus or by the type, but the coating prevents the passage of ink at all other portions of the material.

There are a number of excellent stencil papers of this kind on the market at the present time, and an of these may be used. All of these papers, owever, areextremely thin, the .collodion or other coating being applied to a high grade long fiber paper of the socalled tissue variety. The strength of such thinner 'vapieties, effect remarkable reproductions o writing, typing, printing and other characters and particularly the characters of the or 'nary typewriting machine. Moreover, the suppleness and limpness of this paper admirably adapts it for my present purpose inasmuch as it offers substantially no resistance to rolling, and does not noticeably increase the stiffness of the strip. What stiffness the address strip possesses is caused substantially entirely by the carrier web, but the grid-hke formation of the carrier greatly reduces the stiffness so that the address strip can easily be wound into rolls.

The carrier web is uniformly punched along the margins 14 at regular intervals,

. preferably opposite the centers of the perforations 12, these holes 16 being provided to receive the pins or teeth on the address strip feedin rollers of the addressing machine in wh1ch the address strip is used.

The'carrier web is perfectly smooth on both surfaces. It has no projections to increase the thickness when the address strip is wound into a roll, or which might print undesirable lines on the letter or envelope, and which might be apt to catch upon various portions of the addressing machine in passing through it. The same is true of the stencil material-11, and the two elements of the strip being cemented or glued smoothly together, and the stencil material being relatively thin, the overall thickness of the address strip is not materially greater than the thickness of the carrier web.

My improved address strip is preferably stored in rolls such as illustrated in Fig. 3, and to prevent soiling of the under surface of the strip by ink, a protective strip 15 of plain paper is wound into the roll to serve as ashield between adjacent convolutions'of the address strip. Such rolls are intended to be sold to users of addressing machines in which the addressstrips are adapted to be employed.

In using the address strip the first operation is to place on the strip the desired addresses from the list of addresses to which it is desired to send letters. This is no small task since the rolls not infrequently -accommodate two or more thousand addresses in a single strip, yet this work can readily be done upon an ordinary typewriting machine, since my improved address strip is continuous and relatively flexible and can be very easily passed around the platen of the typewriting machine.

From the standpoint of manipulating the strip in the typewriting machine it may be considered as having uniform thickness as there are no thickened portions such as are occasioned by hinging together a plurality of individual address plates to form a chain.

It is to be understood that the invention can be used for addressing postcards, broadsides, wrappers and mailing ieces of various kinds as well as letters an envelopes.

The addresses are typed in the respective address sections which correspond to the perforations 12. Because of the uniform thickness and the continuity of the improved address strip, the typist readily brings the successive address sections into the proper position for typing each address in the same relative position in each address section, by rotating the typewriter platen in the usual manner.

This is an important consideration. In order to have the address printed accurately in the same relative position on each letter or envelope, each address must be placed accurately in the same relative position in each of the uniformly spaced address sections or spaces, because the addressing machineautomatically advances the address strip a uniform distance between the printing of successive addresses.

.After the address list has been transferred to the address strip in this way, the address strip is run through the addressing machine, and the addresses thereby transferred to as many letters or envelopes as desired. It is not deemed necessary to describe in detail the addressing machine, and it is believed sufficient to state that the addressing machine brings the lower surface of each address section successively into contact with the respective sheet or envelope to which the address is to be transferred. Then this transference is accomplished by the application of ink to the upper surface of the address strip, the ink passing through the address strip where the various letters or other characters have been typed or marked upon the strip. The ink may be applied to the upper surface of the address strip in any desired manner, such for example as by means of a brush, a roller, or an inked ribbon.

What I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent of the United States is:

1. As a new article of manufacture, an addressing device comprising a roll of composite strip material having a carrier web portion of indeterminate length consisting of a thin, tough, flexible material provided with means for receiving mechanism for feeding the strip through an addressing machine, and a continuous stencil portion of thin stencil material secured to the carrier web, the

carrier web having uniformly spaced rectangula-r openings therein, each of said openings outlining a rectangular area of the stencil portion and thereby forming an address section.

2. As a new article of manufacture, an addressing device comprising a composite strip of indeterminate length adapted to pass through an addressing machine and consisting of a continuous carrier web and thin stencil material secured thereto, the carrier web being made of material sufiiciently flexible to wind into a roll and to unwind therefrom in the addressing machine and be pressed against the surface to be addressed therein, 15

said material being sufiiciently tough to withstand being run through the addressin machine a plurality of times but not inde itely, and having uniformly spaced rectangular openings therein through which. the stencil material appears in the form of address sections.

In testimony whereof I aflix my signature.

I ELMER B. PYLE. 

